So, is Community been renewed or cancelled with a wrap up couple shows / season? I like all 3 shows, but Community to me is must see & awesome, IMO. The Paintball episode may be one of the best television sitcom episodes in history.

I don't get why NBC does so poor when networks like CBS have a lot of crap except for How I Met Your Mother.

Amazing how CBS essentially traded spots when CBS outbid NBC for the NFL rights as Primary network for AFC games. Well, if I recall, Fox took the NFC from CBS, and CBS took the AFC from NBC.

I don't get why NBC does so poor when networks like CBS have a lot of crap except for How I Met Your Mother.

Just a personal theory, but I believe NBC has in recent years been trying to draw a younger audience, which is I think more difficult to retain than the more geriatric crowd that watches CBS. They're also the audience most likely to be doing other things than sitting at home during primetime watching TV, and is the audience most likely to watch shows through other means like hulu (or piracy). They also have a tendency to put their big new shows up against established shows, which basically puts them behind the 8-ball (like having Prime Suspect, The Firm and Awake on Thursday at 10/9). And part of the problem is just that the NBC brand as a whole right now is the low dog on the totem poll, and perception is reality. They're in last place, so their shows must suck.

I am waiting for NBC and maybe even the CW to give the middle finger to the Nielson company and say they're getting their ad numbers else where so it will include a much broader (and more accurate) rating. I have heard numbers as low as 20,000 people who are counted for Nielson ratings. It makes me sad to think that networks have to fold under them to be successful.

The common trend is people now more than ever are watching less primetime TV with the exception of sports. Something has gotta give, and I am betting it will be the outdated rating system before anything else.

I think Friends is better than Seinfeld. Seinfeld was certainly quirkier. But Friends was a game changer. I think Friends feels less groundbreaking now because so many sitcoms since have been modeled after it. Seinfeld had a formula that it's almost impossible to copy. In that sense, Seinfeld is one of the best and most original shows I've ever seen.

The downside is that I don't think that brand of humor holds up as well over time. When it worked the humor was untouchable. But it missed as much as it hit. And when that brand of humor misses... yikes. Friends might have been safer (less risky in terms of style of humor), but it was also more consistent for longer.

Having said that, I still think both shows went on a couple seasons too long.

The world of entertainment really went downhill after the 90s. I guess I'm just an 80s/90s kid

Mainstream entertainment is by and large horrifying and mortifying to me at this point, but at the same time we're in basically a golden age for TV dramas and have had some all-time classic comedies, to boot. It's like a cesspool with a few incredibly clean spots.

Quote:

Originally Posted by keg in kc

I never really liked Seinfeld all that much, and it's always struck me as one of those shows that was popular because it was the 'in' thing at the time.

Seinfeld is genuinely brilliant, though I might be biased after watching every episode in a row several times over. It weirds me out every time I remember how huge it was.

Also, even the (ignorantly) maligned later seasons feature a lot of the funniest episodes and characters in the series, thus making them some of the funniest things in the glorious history of the medium of television itself.

I think Friends is better than Seinfeld. Seinfeld was certainly quirkier. But Friends was a game changer. I think Friends feels less groundbreaking now because so many sitcoms since have been modeled after it. Seinfeld had a formula that it's almost impossible to copy. In that sense, Seinfeld is one of the best and most original shows I've ever seen.

The downside is that I don't think that brand of humor holds up as well over time. When it worked the humor was untouchable. But it missed as much as it hit. And when that brand of humor misses... yikes. Friends might have been safer (less risky in terms of style of humor), but it was also more consistent for longer.

Having said that, I still think both shows went on a couple seasons too long.

I liked Friends, but it went too long.

Seinfeld could have went a few more seasons. Its humor still holds up today.

What Seinfeld did was open the doors for every stand-up comic out there to get their own show. Cosby and Redd Foxx and some others had done it OK before, but Seinfeld (maybe along with Roseanne) was the beginning of the new crop of comedians in a new kind of sitcom, where the plots were based on the comedian's act, and (s)he was the undoubted center of the show. From him, we got Home Improvement, Everybody Loves Raymond, Jeff Foxworthy, Drew Carey, George Lopez, King of Queens, Grace Under Fire, Bernie Mac, and probably a whole bunch of others I can't remember.

I never liked Friends, probably because it seemed fabricated to me; I could never get past the fact that those twentysomethings, besides being pretentious and annoying, would never be able to afford that spacious apartment in midtown New York.

I never liked Friends, probably because it seemed fabricated to me; I could never get past the fact that those twentysomethings, besides being pretentious and annoying, would never be able to afford that spacious apartment in midtown New York.

What Seinfeld did was open the doors for every stand-up comic out there to get their own show. Cosby and Redd Foxx and some others had done it OK before, but Seinfeld (maybe along with Roseanne) was the beginning of the new crop of comedians in a new kind of sitcom, where the plots were based on the comedian's act, and (s)he was the undoubted center of the show. From him, we got Home Improvement, Everybody Loves Raymond, Jeff Foxworthy, Drew Carey, George Lopez, King of Queens, Grace Under Fire, Bernie Mac, and probably a whole bunch of others I can't remember.